Life after Traumatic Brain Injury

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I didn’t want to write this, I didn’t have it in me. My brainiversary blog posts are normally fairly upbeat affairs with a nice message and a catchy poem or quote. But in all honesty since July I’ve been feeling anything but jaunty. I didn’t really want to start my next year of recovery on a bum note but here I am.

I then realised that it’s ok to not be ok and it’s even more ok to express that. There are loads of us who are not ok right now. To pretend I’m something that I am most definitely not right now does myself and others a disservice. I’m not entirely sure where this post will end up, so I’m just going to write and see what happens.

The duvet of safety has become my home once more as about 95% of my time since July has been spent underneath it, gestating or incubating or whatever else is boring and still. I’ve got up when I’ve needed to attend something such as my PIP tribunal (which incidentally, I won) but gone straight back to doing my best impression of a plank of wood as soon as I get home. Even the sweet victory at my tribunal got buried underneath the layers of bleurgh that currently hover around my atmosphere.

There are many reasons for the reappearance of my ennui and despair, some that I can put my finger on, others that are hidden within the folds of my temporal lobe (some brain lingo for you there). One of the obvious reasons is that my brain is damaged, mood change 101 right there. Other reasons are the upcoming anniversary that always chirps in, a longer than usual bout of fatigue and a pervasive feeling of stress that is hanging around. There are other reasons that are making me particularly vulnerable due to factors mentioned above. This is stuff that just makes me break inside and feel impotent because I can’t help. When I’m low like this my shell is fragile and I just can’t cope with anything, I know all the advice about worrying about things only within my realm of control but there are times such as now when my faith in myself and humanity goes missing.

I feel so trapped at the moment, trapped by my body that won’t do what I want it to do, trapped by the ignorance and stupidity of others, trapped by society, trapped by the benefit system, trapped, trapped, trapped. There just seems to have been a huge tidal wave of what I will call ‘shite’ that makes my heart hurt. Are you ready for the list of ‘what is currently making Braingirl angry and sad’? Ok, here goes; The selfish actions of farmers in Hurricane Florence territory who despite having 2 weeks warning about the flooding, decided to lock all their animals in cages and leave them to drown in the flood (current estimate is 3.4 million lives) all treated like commodities they can claim on the insurance because we think we own sentient creatures. Hambacher Forest, a 12,000 year old forest in Germany, home to 142 species regarded as important to conservation, casually being torn down right now by a company called RWE for coal mining. The badger cull being rolled out across the UK, where farmers are being offered money to catch and shoot badgers in the head for no concrete scientific reason. Kaporos festival in New York, basically a chicken slaughter festival where thousands of lives are taken and dumped on the streets all in the name of religion. Then finding out 5 species of bird have recently gone extinct in the Amazon due to clearance for animal grazing for an effing beef burger (I’m looking at you MuckDonalds and you can shove your new vegan burger up your golden arches). If this doesn’t make you angry then you’re not paying attention.

This my friends was all in the month of September. This stuff goes on and on and on and yet we still as a society do absolutely nothing (and those that do get the most hideous abuse on social media by people who think ‘bacon tho’ is a clever and intelligent response to a call for compassion). Well I’m fed up mateys, totally fed up. I want to join the Hunt sabs but I can’t, my brain won’t let me, I want to go to protests, but I can’t, my brain won’t let me. I want to liberate animals, but I can’t, my brain won’t let me. All I can do is the moral baseline of being vegan and supporting those that CAN do what I can’t. I can’t be silent anymore. If you’re on Instagram follow @thesavemovement @animalliberationfront @unoffensiveanimal @undergroundbadgersyndicate show them some love and support for being on the frontline.

I massively digressed there but after more than 2 months of inertia and frustration getting that out was very therapeutic! Where do I go from here? I try to reason with myself and give myself that pep talk about feeling what I feel and being kind to myself and all that jazz, so here I am, with you, feeling my feelings. Despite everything I am usually fairly upbeat and progressive, I usually have an inordinate amount of hope in the goodness of humans but right now I want to give everyone a bloody good rattle, WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU!

I went to my homie (am I too old to say homie?) Rumi for some good talk, here’s what he told me.

How appropriate for just after the Autumn Equinox, dead leaves a-dropping all over the place. I suppose for my 6 year brainiversary it’s time to let the dead leaves drop, time to drop toxic people, toxic mindsets, toxic habits, drop sitting in my own insecurities about how I’m received and if it offends people and start to speak my truth. I need it and my furry, feathered and scaled brethren REALLY need it. Face year 7 in its face, stop stirring your own stew Braingirl and rule your world from your bed if you have to.

P.s. A small candle of good news this month was that I passed my final Horticulture exams with a commendation. All that work was worth it.

This song has been percolating around my noggin for weeks, here, you have it.

Like this:

I can sense Autumn in the air, I can smell it. We had a glorious Summer, which served as a battery charger for me but also gave my anxious brain opportunity to worry about the damage we are doing to our beautiful earth. Too much heat, not enough water, it’s time to drop those selfish habits folks.

The last time I left the house and went further than the end of the drive was the 6th July. I dipped outside briefly in this time, not often, to check on my veggies and catch some sun but every single step drained me. I’ve been in bed for over a month, the longest most testing time I’ve had for years. I always knew my recovery would peak and trough but I thought at least that those long dark days of despair were much reduced. How wrong I was, it’s like my brain knows when I’m too comfortable and decides to remind me just how out of control I am. Maybe it’s a pattern that will repeat until I JUST BLOODY LEARN to stop dropping into old habits, or maybe, more realistically it’s the nature of living with a brain injury. Funny that I can STILL forget that sometimes.

So the past month has been spent in partial darkness, listening to paranormal podcasts, staring at the ceiling and crying. I was at points, at the very edge of my mind, hopeless, frustrated, scared, in that liminal space between living and ceasing to exist. I’m slowly surfacing once more, there’s a gentle coming together of mind and spirit that is one of the most hope-filled feelings I’ll ever experience. I thought that was it this time, I wasn’t coming back, so when you do the relief is palpable.

What can be done at these times? To be frank, not much. I accept what is happening and let it do it’s thing. I know it eventually passes. Aside from that I rest, I rest like a sloth taking some time off. This is all that helps, I am too fatigued to move so anyone who tells me I need to have a short walk to energise myself is told in no uncertain terms to eff off. It’s more than enough for me to make sure I’m not peeing myself. I’ll say this louder for those at the back HAVING FATIGUE AFTER A BRAIN INJURY IS NOT THE SAME AS BEING TIRED. Oh to only be tired!

Now, taking time out from the world to fully rest is not ideal in some aspects, it’s a long time out of action, things go undone, life gets unlived and you become dissociated from everything. I didn’t know what day it was and when I looked in the mirror, it took me a while to realise that it was me looking back. Due to the insular nature of this aspect of recovery, I also don’t reach out to people. A time when I need it more than ever. There’s a few reasons for this, one being that I’m just too knackered to interact but also there’s the fact that there’s nothing anyone can do so I don’t want to bring anyone down with me. I realise these are just excuses I tell myself to avoid being vulnerable and believe me, at these times, I am massively vulnerable.

I ended up emailing The Samaritans, it was a strange experience. Useful but also somewhat robotic. It helped me through the hump but also made me think about how despite writing this blog and attending psychology I’ve still never shown the guts of all this. I’ve never fully raged about how devastating this TBI has been. Showing such depth of emotion can make people uncomfortable, they don’t know what to say or do and can often say things that make you feel invalidated so you end up not bothering.

I think next time I’m alone in the house I’m going to scream my lungs out. I’m going to shout every single swear word I know and expel that energy that is swimming around in my tummy and chest. The thing I have noticed about this layer being removed though is that my passion for music is back. I am more focused and determined to play guitar and sing again. More so than I’ve ever felt. Maybe it was just waiting in hibernation ready to be catapulted outwards.

Listen to: First Day of my life – Bright Eyes

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Our Winter this year was a long, cold and depressing one. It never seemed to end and kept dipping back down into misery after it had fooled us with a day or two of warmer temperatures. Then Summer arrived with a big glittery explosion about 4 weeks ago. It’s been hot, bright and energising. Now I can point out the parallels between the weather and brain injury recovery but that’s too obvious right?

Whilst enjoying this beautiful, bountiful display of solar power there have been significant changes occurring in my life. As you know we moved house a month ago. We are settled now but it was a huge upheaval. Then this Thursday just past, I had my last college class for the Horticulture course I am about to finish in 9 days when I do my exams (actually I need to be revising now but I’m procrastinating and writing this instead).

I’m currrently experimenting with a new routine that occurred after a day I had of feeling incredibly angry and despondent about everything. I was snot-crying and shouting at myself, just so sick and tired of the ‘stuck-ness’ – the big pause that occurs with a traumatic event or chronic condition. So I gave myself a huge kick up the arse and told myself that if I want to see change, I have to make it. Hard when your reserves of energy don’t allow for massive leaps but my small steps are fine enough for me.

I suppose I wanted to write this post to convey the vulnerability that I feel, that we all feel when life has come to a point where it’s offering up another one of those pesky crossroads. Neuro typical me would barrel through like a tank, just following my gut and taking no prisoners. Wonky brain me overthinks, gets scared and second guesses what I need to do. Whilst I was studying at college I had something to focus on, a purpose and I suppose to some extent something to hide in, a place where no decisions had to be made. Now I keeep getting asked what I’m going to do ‘next’ now my course has finished and to be honest – I have absolutely no idea.

That though, is not the answer people want.

So I get sent into a tailspin thinking I have to have all the answers and that there has to be something to go onto. All those old feelings of failure and panic because I haven’t put anything in place for ‘next’ and ‘next after that’ and ‘even more next after that next’. Then I pull my head out from my bum and remember that all that kind of nonsense got confined to the bin after my TBI. That striving and rushing and forcing outcomes. A place where a lot of people are still stuck because it’s hard to conceive anything outside of the lifestyle we are drip fed on a daily basis.

I may have mentioned this before but I can’t remember, it’s a Shamanistic belief that people who endure huge trauma are born again into magic. I like that. I like the idea of magic growing after massive loss.

Surviving a trauma can certainly give you a new perspective on life, I find a lot of the time that the things people do and say baffles me. I can’t understand why they are fighting themselves daily. There’s also definitely a huge part of society that I just don’t take very seriously anymore. This is incredibly freeing but also makes you feel like an alien. Especially when everyone can seem so angry about nothing.

I’m at a stage now where whatever is next for me is whatever comes along and gets my attention, I have to not go back into that urge to solve and control. It feels a bit like limbo and that can feel scary, maybe it’s time to fall into that fear.

I’ve not really been in a time or headspace to write any posts recently. Lack of inspiration, lack of energy and a tsunami of ‘life events’ have prevented me doing anything else.

Firstly it’s May and someone needs to tell the sun that. We are having small breakthroughs of nice weather punctuated massively by grey, drizzly, cold and miserable shite. This does not help my mood or my energy. At all.

Then there’s been family stuff, exam stuff, legal stuff and the biggest humdinger of them all was 2 months ago when our landlady told us with regret that she is selling the house we rented. As we all know with the ‘law of the way things are’ stuff happens in life ALL AT ONCE. Pre injury me would don my uniform and fire fight with the best of them, with a POW and a CRASH I’d see off all enemies and then go and have lunch. Post injury me and my brain just says “aw dude, this IS NOT what I’m down with anymore, I’m just going to go and nap”. My reserves deplete very quickly and I’m zombie braingirl shuffling through peril whilst looking for a hiding spot.

As you can imagine when we were told that the house was going on the market, I just crumpled, literally and figuratively. I sank to the floor and cried my little heart out. It brought out all my feelings of vulnerability, of feeling unsafe and at the mercy of the world. I was losing a magical place where I could heal and feel safe, a place that held me when I couldn’t hold myself and where me and Mr Braingirl loved enough to get married in the garden. I needed time to process and adjust, change is not an instant thing for me now, I have to wait for my brain and my energy levels to catch up. It took me about a week of feeling melancholy and paper thin before I could activate myself and then we had to solve the problem of finding somewhere new to live.

Whilst this was going on all the other stuff began to pile up too. Things that required instant action and an abundance of energy. Hahhaha yeah right. I tried to chunk thing up into steps like I was told but when everything needs your attention all at once it’s kind of difficult. So I did the only thing I could do, grit my teeth, rest whenever I could and get on with it. I was also heard muttering to myself on a regular basis “this too shall pass” this was the only way I could stem the overwhelm of everything in front of me.

So you find me here, in my new house after 2 months of packing and stressing and being sad. A new house that is in a lovely place with mountains and forests and a garden I can work in right outside the door. So moral of the story is even the tough stuff can sometimes be for the best. I tested my mettle in a big way and found some of that old fighting spirit I used to have in bundles. Don’t get me wrong. I’m exhausted and not sleeping very well due to not being relaxed and having my brain whizzing. It may take me a good while to get back on my feet again and there’s still stuff to sort out and things I have to do but I got a big shock and upheaval and I’m still here, breathing. My hair is messy and I’m a bit smelly but I’m here.

It’s been a while huh? Or at least it feels that way as Winter often does. Slowly crawling through the cold dark nights until the faster warmer energy of Spring hits. February often brings a great feeling of hope for me as I feel new life begin to stir and start to think about my new season of seed sowing. My energy levels definitely match the season, I‘ve been half asleep for most of Winter, wanting to hibernate and sleep, a feeling we all get I’m sure.

Despite the urge to curl up I’ve been active when needed, I aged another year in January (I’ve started counting backwards now!) and just last week I did two more Horticulture exams, exams number 5 and 6 out of 8. I revised for two months for these exams because they were hard. Lots of Latin names and features of plants to learn. I ended up dreaming about trees and randomly had names of shrubs popping into my brain like intrusive thoughts whilst I was driving or in the shower. There has literally been no time for anything else whilst this was going on. No more multi tasking for me. One thing at a time please.

I only have 4 months left now until my last pair of exams and the end of my 2 year course. This has brought up so many strange feelings. I have LOVED doing this course, yes it’s hard, but I’ve loved it. I love the fact I’ve learnt about something totally new, I love that it meant I had to get out of bed, I love that I met new people and I love that it’s something that has felt so heart-full. Something that resonates with who I am. But this now leaves me feeling a bit in limbo, where do I go from here? When this is all over what do I do next? I know I want to continue with Horticulture but I’ve no idea how. There’s a level 3 course available but no one in Northern Ireland teaches it, it would mean distance learning via Edinburgh and hopping over there to take exams. A lot of faff right? I don’t want to learn all this wonderful stuff and just leave it lying dormant in my brain to eventually disappear.

Horticultural Therapy is a route I’ve considered but on researching it’s difficult to find just HOW you get there, no specified route, just like post-TBI life I suppose. I’m in equal parts extremely happy and grateful to have nearly completed the course but also sad and lost about it ending. This as always has parallels with how Brain Injury feels. You spend a lot of time wondering just where you go next or where you have gone or how you fit into society anymore. It’s a strange limbo too.

All this time I’ve been unplugged from what is deemed the accepted way of living, I’ve grown. Just like one of my beloved plants I’ve rooted and shooted into my own space. The further I go into discovery the more and more I know that modern living has got it all wrong. Believe me, it has. I’ve always known really but never been brave enough to step outside of it fully. My TBI gave me a chance to peep behind the curtain properly and show me what is acceptable to me to help me grow and finally learn to love myself. I never did, you see, always so hard on myself chasing perfectionism, chasing chasing chasing…….well nothing really because ultimately it was always here. As a kid I was totally uncensored and brave and in the moment then life knocked it out of me as it does with us all. The young me didn’t question about being ‘enough’ or wonder if so and so would approve, she did it anyway. I like to think some of that has come back since my brain got a factory reset.

There was also the realisation that I no longer think obsessively about what happened. There are weeks now where it doesn’t even enter my head. I can still get frustrated about my LACK OF ENERGY and my inability to sustain activity. Do I wish I wasn’t fatigued? Of course I do, but I am, so that’s where we are. I still have a cry at times but I don’t think about it every day. Therein lies acceptance. All this time I’ve been waiting for a whizz bang explosion of glorious acceptance showering me with golden light but instead what it did was slither quietly into existence. No light bulb moment just gentle, expansive post traumatic growth.

So I reckon with lots of falling over and near drowning and howling at the storm I may have, just maybe finally learnt to surf.

There was a time in my hazy past in the period directly after my brain injury when the thought of being 5 years along seemed like an untouchable made up place. When I was sinking in quicksand every day, 5 years into the future was a place that was full of exhaustion and fear. Today I’m hitting that 5 year mark, and it is a liminal time for me. A time when the deja vu that is my anniversary effect whips me backwards and forwards out of the present and into dark corners. A time of contrasts – great sadness followed by gratitude followed by fear.

I’m still making baby steps in my recovery. I’m still traumatised and lost and I’m also still having moments when I conquer stormy waters. There have been little light bulb moments happening to me throughout the past 6 months especially. Moments of learning and acceptance of myself. Moments where the TBI comes and pokes me in the eye again and reminds me that it’s still hanging around.

An example of this is my inability to socialise like I used to. When I have the energy to be around others I’ve discovered that it feels like I’m from another planet. I am not neuro typical anymore, I can not do small talk and I have lost my brain to mouth filter. I find that a mixture of social anxiety, unwired neurons and the fact that I don’t get to talk very much so when I’m around others I can’t stop yakking, all contribute to some odd discussions. I say things out loud that I need to keep to myself, I interrupt others, I do not shut up and I’m unflinchingly honest and open. I am acutely aware that I’m verbally diarrhoea-ing over everyone and that I sometimes say things that make people feel a little embarrassed. The end result is I feel odd, out of place and weird. I then tell myself that people don’t want to be around me and listen to me and that I’m somehow not ‘normal’.

‘Normal’ is a funny word, we use it to describe the average persons daily activity and behaviour but I know that there’s not really such a thing as ‘normal’ anymore. I suppose I’ve always been a bit eccentric, a square peg in a round hole, since my TBI that has compounded. But here’s the thing, whilst in the past my eccentricities have been something I felt I needed to hide to ‘fit in’ (a mistake if there ever was one, I needed to celebrate my oddness), I now, most of the time, don’t care a jot. I was told a few weeks ago that I’ve gone ‘a bit strange’ my response to that was that maybe I’m the sane one.

I want to own who I am and where I’ve been. I want to own the beauty in my life, the things that make me curious and joyful. My strangeness is my strength. My strangeness is my medal, I earned it my friends. I’m a tree hugging hippy, I care about animals and people and the Earth so I live my values as a vegan, I believe in Magic, I think universal love is massively important and powerful, I have a head full of fanciful notions, I read tarot cards, cleanse crystals, talk to plants, believe in ghosts and see fairies. I talk too much, I can be a frightened rabbit, I wear pyjamas too much, I am fiercely loyal and incredibly stubborn, I grieve and cry, I am exhausted and I give up many times. I am all these things. I am dark and light, full of contrasts and imperfections. Isn’t it wonderful.

This blog has been popping into my head the past week or so, I took it as a sign to pay it some attention. I haven’t written anything since May. I can’t believe how fast the past 3 months have gone. But as always with the brain injury clock it’s also gone really really slowly. A contradiction that sounds daft but honestly, that’s how time passes for us who aren’t neuro typical anymore.

The past three months have also been a time of contrasts in my recovery. I had a huge surge of energy that lasted a while around May/June then I crashed heavily for most of July. My depressive episodes have come and gone and I’ve spent some time hiding from the world when I got overwhelmed with everything. My time off Facebook however has been nothing but positive. I love not having it in my life anymore and I didn’t spontaneously combust without it!

There’s been some awesome stuff happening, we resuced a dog from a sanctuary (adopt don’t shop folks) and he’s a bit nuts and anxious and hyper vigilant (just like his human mother!) but he’s also fun and cuddly and smart as a whip. He’s my new best mate and thanks to Agent Cooper (we renamed him and it suits him so well) I’m embarking on another attempt at exercise. I missed exercising so much, I missed that it made me feel fit and strong. I got a hands free jogging lead for me and the dog and we’re now trying to follow a schedule of short runs until I can start to build up my fitness. This always brings with it a whole new wall of fear and issues to overcome around initiation and motivation. I’m great at ideas but not so great at following through. My brain is just not a fan of initiating action. That’s why I hardly ever cook anymore and when I do it’s simple quick stuff like mushrooms on toast. My lack of cooking activity is a task I really want to conquer, another day, another hill to climb.

Just look at his face!

Another great thing is my enrolment onto Year two of my Horticulture course. I did 4 exams in my first year as well as attending lectures. I seriously never thought I’d make it through the first year, but here I am, one month away from starting Year two and hopefully qualifying. Then stuff gets real, I have to decide what I’m actually going to do with the qualification. I like the idea of Horticultural Therapy but that could all change by next year.

I also enrolled on a 6 week singing course over the Summer. I used to love singing but I lost it all post TBI. I wanted to give myself permission to use my voice again so did a quick course in Belfast which brought with it more challenges – fatigue, other people, driving around the city centre, going somewhere new and doing something very uncomfortable for me. But I loved it and I can now sing in the shower right from the centre of myself, belting it out with the best of them.

In amongst tears and fatigue and dog walking I’ve also had the first anniversary of our handfasting and had family come and visit. A challenging time but I definitely think I was more ‘with it’ this time than the last visit.

Along with the ‘done’ stuff comes the ‘not done’. I’m told to acknowledge my achievements and be proud (this is actually very hard for me to do) but there are always things that I desire. My guitar, my poor guitar. I still haven’t picked it up. I hate that it’s something I love but I can’t bring myself to do. There are fear issues around making my brain too tired but also the frustration of only being able to do five minutes on it before my brain does a loop de loop in my head and gives up. There’s also the fact that I’m starting again, from the beginning and that annoys me. Any guitar players who want to sit with me and kick me up the jacksy please get in touch.

Also not done is cooking, as mentioned above, no full on kitchen action for me. I used to be quite good at the old cooking malarkey, now it’s just a series of terrifying ingredients that I have no idea what to do with. I’d also like to learn another language. I have Brazilian Portuguese cds for the car but again, lack of initiation is my downfall. Maybe I’m setting the bar too high and need to start getting the basics of life into a routine again but I’m a dreamer and an ideas woman. Always jumping around in my brain from one thing to another of all these things I want to achieve. I reckon in my head I’m a renaissance woman, full of talent and creativity and the ability to do all things but in reality I’m brain damage woman, full of trauma and fear and slow neurons. One day the two women will be aligned and I will live happily somewhere between them both.

What are your big ideas that are frustratingly out of reach right now?